Journalist Says He Was 'Stripped, Urinated On' By Cops In Shamli, UP Police Suspends 2

News24 journalist Amit Sharma was reportedly covering the derailment of a goods train near Shamli in Uttar Pradesh

A Reserve Police Line inspector and a constable were on Monday suspended for allegedly beating up a journalist in Uttar Pradesh’s Shamli district, police said Tuesday.

We have come across a video where a journalist has been beaten up & put up in a lock up. DGP UP OP Singh has ordered for immediate suspension of SHO GRP Shamli Rakesh Kumar & Const. Sanjay Pawar. Strict punishment shall be accorded to policemen misbehaving with citizens.

News24 journalist Amit Sharma was covering the derailment of a goods train near Shamli when he was allegedly dragged to the GRP police station and stripped and harassed, Times Now reported.

Sharma later released a video in which he says, “GRP and railway officials were at the spot when I had gone for the coverage. The GRP personnel along with other cops beat me up. The mobile phone, which I used for shooting the news clip was hit and is missing. They also hurled abuses at me,” PTI reported.

Sharma added, “I was put in a lock up. They forced me to take off my clothes, and then they urinated on me.”

However, Ram Lakhan Mishra denied the allegations levelled by the journalist.

A senior UP government official, quoting Shamli Senior Superintendent of Police Ajay Kumar Pandey, said the action was taken after the two GRP personnel thrashed Sharma.

“The incident took place when the journalist had gone to cover the derailment of a few bogies of a goods trains in Shamli. There was a heated exchange of words among them and hurling of abuses,” Ram Lakhan Mishra, the Circle Officer, GRP, Saharanpur, told PTI.

A senior GRP official told the news agency the journalist was released around 7 am Wednesday.

#WATCH Shamli: GRP personnel thrash a journalist who was covering the goods train derailment near Dhimanpura tonight. He says, "They were in plain clothes. One hit my camera&it fell down. When I picked it up they hit&abused me. I was locked up, stripped&they urinated in my mouth" pic.twitter.com/nS4hiyFF1G

Journalist Piyush Rai shared a videos of Sharma in jail in which he is seen saying the attack was a retaliation for a negative story.

The News 24 journalist, locked up in the GRP station, can be heard narrating the ordeal. He dubbed the attack as a retaliation for a negative story. Accused inspector/SHO Rakesh Kumar sat on chair and kept confronting other journalists protesting against the incident. pic.twitter.com/dVSPrGKog7

The incident comes a day after the Supreme Court ordered the immediate release of journalist Prashant Kanojia, arrested for allegedly sharing objectionable posts on Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath.

Kanojia had allegedly shared a video on Twitter and Facebook wherein a woman is seen speaking to reporters of various media organisations outside the chief minister’s office in Lucknow, claiming she had sent a marriage proposal to Adityanath.

An FIR was registered against Kanojia at the Hazratganj police station in Lucknow on the night of June 7, alleging that the accused made “objectionable comments against the chief minister and tried to malign his image”. The journalist was arrested the next day from his East Delhi home and a Lucknow court remanded him to judicial custody till June 22.

The apex court said it was granting bail to Kanojia as it disapproved the deprivation of right to liberty by the state.